LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


Gl  FT    OF 


^ 

Class 


THE  NEXT  STEP 

IN 

AGRICULTURAL  EDUCATION 

OR 

THE  PLACE  OF  AGRICULTURE  IN  OUR 
AMERICAN  SYSTEM  OF  EDUCATION 


AN   ADDRESS 

BY 

E.   DAVENPORT 

Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture  and  Director  of 

the  Agricultural  Experiment  Station, 

University  of  Illinois 


URBANA,  ILLINOIS 


This  address  was  read  first  at  Illinois  College,  Jacksonville, 
October  31,  1907,  and  after  some  alterations  read,  as  here  printed, 
at  Missouri  State  University,  Columbia,  January  9,  1908. 


THE    NEXT    STEP    IN    AGRICULTURAL 
EDUCATION 

OR 

THE  PLACE  OF  AGRICULTURE  IN  OUR  AMERICAN 
SYSTEM   OF  EDUCATION 

The  most  significant  fact  in  the  educational  world  to-day 
is  the  demand  that  agriculture  be  taught  in  the  public  schools. 

This  is  a  radically  new  movement  in  education.  Twen- 
ty-five years  ago — fifteen  years  ago — it  was  unheard  of.  At 
that  time,  had  the  proposition  been  made,  it  would  have  inter- 
ested neither  the  farmer  nor  the  educator ;  the  one  would  have 
been  indifferent,  the  other  would  have  been  horrified  or 
amazed,  according  as  the  humor  of  it  might  have  struck  him. 
To-day  it  is  a  live  problem  in  which  both  the  farmer  and  the 
educator  are  seriously  interested,  and  it  is  one  whose  solution 
concerns  them  both. 

Thinking  men  of  all  classes  are  now  agreed  that  in  some 
way  and  after  some  fashion  agriculture  must  be  taught  in  our 
public  schools,  both  primary  and  secondary ;  meaning  by  agri- 
culture not  only  the  occupation  of  farming,  but  also  the  life 
of  the  farmer  and  the  genius  and  spirit  of  country  affairs ;  for 
agriculture  is  not  only  a  profession  but  it  is  a  mode  of  life. 
It  is,  of  course,  unnecessary  to  emphasize  the  peculiar  impor- 
tance of  teaching  the  fundamental  principles  and  practices 
necessary  to  permanent  systems  of  successful  agriculture. 
Other  great  industries  are  commonly  controlled  from  central 
offices,  but  every  farmer  must  have  knowledge  sufficient  to 
make  him  intelligent  concerning  methods  essential  to  perma- 
nent agricultural  prosperity. 

1 


166445 


Now,  two  radically  different  methods  have  been  proposed 
for  meeting  this  new  educational  demand  in  the  secondary 
schools.  The  one  method  proposes  a  separate  system  of  schools 
for  country  people,  to  be  known  as  agricultural  high  schools, 
farm  schools,  etc.,  in  which  agriculture  for  boys  and  domestic 
science  for  girls  should  be  the  leading  subjects  taught,  assum- 
ing that  existing  high  schools  in  general  shall  be  known  and 
considered  as  "city  schools,"  whose  business  it  is  to  minister 
to  the  people  of  the  cities  and  their  concerns  as  the  agricul- 
tural schools  should  minister  to  the  affairs  of  the  country. 
Several  of  these  agricultural  high  schools  have  been  already 
established,  notably  in  Wisconsin  and  Georgia,  and  a  bill 
which  is  now  in  Congress  is  designed  to  make  the  distinction 
not  only  clear  but  permanent,  as  between  agricultural  high 
schools  that  serve  the  people  and  interests  of  the  country,  and 
city  high  schools  that  serve  the  people  and  interests  of  the  city. 

The  other  method  proposes  not  one  system  of  secondary 
schools  for  the  country  and  another  for  the  city,  but  a  single 
system  for  both.  It  proposes,  for  example,  that  the  present 
system  of  high  schools  should  not  be  denominated  "city  high 
schools"  with  a  narrow  range  of  interests,  but  that  they  should 
be  so  expanded  in  personnel  and  equipment,  and  so  enriched 
in  courses,  as  to  minister  to  the  natural  interests  of  their  en- 
vironment, whatever  they  may  be,  agricultural,  mechanical, 
commercial,  literary,  and  what  not;  and  that  the  present  un- 
graded schools  in  the  thinly  populated  country  districts  shall 
be  condensed  into  larger  and  stronger  units,  meeting  as  they 
are  able  the  educational  needs  of  their  communities,  and  evolv- 
ing naturally  and  ultimately  into  true  secondary  schools. 

The  one  proposal  is  logically  for  as  many  systems  and 
types  of  schools  as  there  are  distinct  interests  and  lines  of 
instruction ;  the  other  is  for  a  single  system  of  education,  with 
highly  differentiated  courses  taught  in  the  same  schools.  The 
one  proposes  to  insert  itself  by  main  strength  into  the  very 
heart  of  our  system  of  secondary  education ;  the  other  must  of 
necessity  develop  by  gradual  process. 

This  demand  has  assumed,  therefore,  serious  proportions 
so  far  as  secondary  schools  are  concerned,  and  in  a  very  large 


sense  we  are  at  the  parting  ,of  the  ways  in  this  matter. 
The  demand  for  education  in  agriculture  has  come  to  stay. 
Indeed,  it  is  but  a  part  of  a  larger  movement  for  industrial 
education ;  meaning  by  that,  education  with  a  view  to 
some  form  of  useful  service  in  the  fundamental  industries 
as  well  as  in  the  so-called  learned  professions.  This  demand 
has  not  only  come  to  stay,  but  it  has  the  sympathy  and 
earnest  support  of  the  masses  of  the  people  and  the  very 
large  majority  of  our  best  educators.  The  only  substantial 
difference  of  opinion  is  as  to  the  best  method  of  procedure, 
whether  by  a  series  of  schools  of  as  many  distinct  types  as 
there  are  occupations  and  interests,  or  by  a  single  system  of 
schools  with  separate  courses.  Which  shall  be  adopted  as  the 
final  American  policy  of  education  is  a  matter  before  us  for 
discussion — and  there  is  at  present  no  deeper  educational  prob- 
lem— and  more  depends  upon  what  we  actually  do  now  within 
the  next  five  years,  than  it  can  depend  on  what  we  think  and 
say  and  try  to  do  twenty-five  years  -from  now. 

This  issue  is  upon  philosophies  of  education  so  widely  dif- 
ferent that  the  choice  once  rnade  will  be  final,  and  the  con- 
sequences well-nigh  irretrievable.  I  am  one  who  firmly  be- 
lieves that  within  the  next  ten  years  we  shall  decide  for  all 
time  whether  we  shall  reap  the  full  fruits  of  our  thoroughly 
unique  educational  opportunities  in  America,  or  whether  we 
shall  needlessly  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  Europe,  where  social 
distinctions  were  established,  and  the  peasant  classes  fully 
fixed,  long  before  the  modern  age  of  universal  education  was 
thought  of. 

Personally,  I  do  not  believe  in  that  philosophy  of  education 
which  would  establish  separate  schools  for  the  various  indus- 
tries and  occupations  of  life.  I  greatly  prefer  that  theory  of 
social  and  industrial  development  which  would  establish  and 
maintain  a  single  system  of  schools  wherein  the  people  of  all 
classes  should  be  educated  together,  distinct  courses  being 
framed  and  conducted  for  the  benefit  'of  each  in  so  far  as  the 
interests  differ  from  those  of  the  common  mass  or  of  other 
professions.  My  reasons  for  this  preference  are  briefly  as 
follows :  \ 


I.  Separate  schools  can  never  be  so  good.  This  is  axio- 
matic for  both  economic  and  pedagogic  reasons.  No  school 
designed  to  minister  to  a  single  class  of  people  and  to  a  single 
line  of  interests  can  ever  be  so  well  equipped  in  the  funda- 
mental arts  and  sciences  —  in  chemistry,  biology,  physics, 
history,  literature,  economics,  and  the  so-called  humanities 
generally  —  no  such  school  can  be  so  well  equipped  as  can 
one  designed  to  minister  broadly  to  a  variety  of  interests. 
Indeed,  even  if  the  attempt  is  made  and  a  wide  range  of  sub- 
jects taught,  these  same  subjects  will  of  necessity  be  studied 
and  taught  from  a  comparatively  narrow  standpoint.  Every 
teacher  knows  and  every  investigator  knows  that  in  order  to 
develop  a  subject  well,  either  for  purposes  of  instruction  or  of 
research,  it  is  necessary  to  establish  and  maintain  a  favorable 
atmosphere  for  that  particular  field  of  mental  activity,  and 
this  atmosphere  is  at  its  best  only  in  the  presence  of  students 
interested  mainly  in  that  subject;  that  is  to  say,  there  is  no  such 
favorable  place  in  which  the  farmer  may  study  chemistry  as 
in  company  with  others,  not  merely  of  his  own  kind  but  of 
those  who  believe  that  chemistry  is  the  greatest  thing  on 
earth.  There  is  no  such  place  for  the  farmer  to  study  history, 
and  to  learn  to  see  himself  as  others  see  him,  as  where  he 
studies  history  in  company  with  those  whose  chief  interest  is 
not  in  agriculture  or  in  engineering  or  in  teaching,  but  rather 
in  history  itself,  by  which  we  study  the  true  significance  of 
world  movements  of  all  classes,  and  come  to  know  things 
past  and  present  in  their  true  perspective.  That  is  to  say, 
every  man  ought  to  be  educated  in  an  atmosphere  not  espe- 
cially prepared  for  him  and  his  own  kind,  but  in  an  atmos- 
phere and  an  environment  much  broader  than  his  own 
interests.  In  this  country,  if  our  democratic  institutions 
are  to  be  preserved,  and  if  our  people  are  to  labor  together  in 
peace  and  understanding,  all  classes  must  be  educated  in  an 
atmosphere  at  least  as  liberal  and  as  broad  as  all  the  interests 
of  any  single  community  can  make  it. 

In  saying  this,  I  do  not  overlook  the  fact  that  the  separate 
agricultural  school  has  certain  distinct  advantages.  They  are 
the  same  advantages  that  are  enjoyed  by  any  other  industrial 


school,  or  even  a  theological  seminary,  arising  from  the 
comparative  simplicity  of  the  educational  contract  they 
undertake.  It  is  a  fact,  of  course,  that  any  school  founded, 
manned,  and  equipped  to  do  a  single  thing  and  minister  to  a 
single  interest  gains  much  in  directness  by  its  simplified  prob- 
lem, and  by  the  direct  methods  it  naturally  employs.  But 
it  loses  in  breadth  and  relative  values,  as  has  been  indicated, 
and  the  best  proof  of  it  is  that  none  of  the  separate  schools 
yet  founded  offer  as  much  even  in  science  as  the  nearby  high 
schools;  and  what  they  achieve  is  industrial  training  rather 
than  industrial  education  —  the  training  of  the  operative  rather 
than  the  education  of  the  citizen. 

Sir  James  Bryce  tells  us  that  the  chief  purpose  in  studying 
history  is  to  throw  light  upon  our  present  action  and  future 
policies,  because  in  a  large  sense  history  does  repeat  itself. 
In  this  connection  it  is  well  to  remind  ourselves  that  agricul- 
tural and  mechanical  education  started  in  this  country  in  sep- 
arate colleges.  This  was  necessary  because  of  the  attitude 
of  old  line  colleges  of  that  day  concerning  industrial  educa- 
tion. But  that  attitude  has  entirely  changed,  and  to-day  these 
two  fundamental  industries  are  strongest,  both  in  instruction 
and  research  —  not  in  the  separate  agricultural  and  mechanical 
colleges,  but  in  our  greatest  universities,  where  all  forms  of 
education  are  imparted,  and  where  American  energy  and 
American  citizenship  are  trained  in  a  cosmopolitan  atmos- 
phere. Not  only  is  this  true,  but  the  proportion  of  agricultural 
students  who  return  to  the  farm  is  greater  from  our  universi- 
ties than  from  our  separate  agricultural  colleges,  to  say  noth- 
ing of  the  masses  of  city  boys  directed  countryward. 

So  I  return  to  my  first  assertion,  viz.,  that  both  from  the 
nature  of  the  case  and  from  the  experience  of  the  past  we 
may  fairly  conclude  that  separate  schools  are  inferior  schools ; 
that  they  lose  more  in  breadth  than  they  gain  in  directness, 
and  can  never  rank  in  real  service  to  that  other  type  which 
ministers  to  many  interests  and  gains  directness  by  its  dis- 
tinctly separate  courses. 

2.  Separate  schools  will  tend  strongly  to  peasantize  the 
farmers.  To  undertake  to  train  the  children  of  farmers 


in  a  system  of  inferior  schools,  such  as  these  must  inevitably 
be,  with  little  knowledge  of  and  less  regard  for  the  affairs  of 
other  people  —  such  an  attempt,  if  it  succeeds,  will  peasantize 
the  farmers  in  America  more  rapidly  and  more  certainly  than 
they  were  peasantized  by  other  causes  in  Europe  generations 
ago. 

To  segregate  any  class  of  people  from  the  common  mass, 
and  to  educate  it  by  itself  and  solely  with  reference  to  its 
own  affairs,  is  to  make  it  narrower  and  more  bigoted  genera- 
tion by  generation.  It  is  to  substitute  training  for  education 
and  to  breed  distrust  and  hatred  in  the  body  politic.  Knowl- 
edge is  necessary  to  a  just  appreciation  of  other  people  and 
their  professions  and  mode  of  life;  with  this  only  can  a  man 
respect  his  own  calling  as  he  ought  and  love  his  neighbor  as 
he  should.  We  cannot  segregate  and  make  an  educational 
cleavage  at  the  line  of  occupations  except  to  the  common  peril. 

Reduced  to  its  lowest  terms,  one  of  the  present  proposi- 
tions is  to  transfer  bodily  the  European  peasant  school  to 
American  country  soil,  the  inevitable  consequences  of  which 
are  not  difficult  to  foresee. 

We  may  one  day  need  the  real  trade  school  in  agriculture — 
the  form  of  instruction  that  aims  at  training  rather  than  edu- 
cation ;  at  information  rather  than  development ;  at  mediocrity 
and  below  rather  than  mediocrity  and  above.  This  time  may 
come,  but  it  is  not  here  now,  and  our  greatest  present  need  in 
agriculture  is  to  educate  the  land-owners  rather  than  their 
hired  operatives;  to  educate  a  class  of  people  upon  the  land 
that  are  in  every  way  the  equal  of  their  compatriots  in  the 
city  or  anywhere  else. 

The  European  peasant  belongs  to  a  class  whose  economic 
and  social  status  was  fixed  generations  ago  by  a  variety  of 
causes,  mostly  political;  and  when  the  problem  of  universal 
education  came  up  for  solution  there  the  only  way  in  which 
the  benefits  of  education  could  be  approximately  enjoyed  by 
all  the  people  was  to  found  a  system  of  peasant  schools  which 
should  secure  results  with  a  maximum  of  manual  training  and 
a  minimum  of  mental  education.  How  difficult  of  achieve- 
ment was  even  this  step,  will  be  appreciated  by  any  student 


of  Irish  industrial  history,  or  by  any  one  who  has  read  Sir 
Horace  Plunkett's  "Ireland  in  the  New  Century." 

When  these  times  come  to  this  country,  if  they  ever  do, 
I  fervently  hope  that  by  that  time  our  secondary  schools  will 
have  become  so  well  organized  and  so  broadly  equipped  as 
to  handle  the  trade  school  together  with  that  higher  form  of 
industrial  education  which  now  engages  our  attention. 

The  American  farmer  is  not  a  peasant.  He  has  never  yet 
been  peasantized,  and  I  fervently  hope  he  never  will  be  peas- 
antized.  He  belongs  mostly  to  the  ancient  and  honorable 
Puritan  stock  descended  from  that  great  middle  class  of  Eng- 
land that  came  to  this  country  to  establish  and  maintain,  not 
aristocratic,  but  democratic  institutions.  This  is  the  stock 
that  first  felled  trees,  then  built  churches  and  school-houses, 
and  prepared  to  govern  themselves  and  to  found  a  nation 
and  a  race  whose  institutions  should  rest  on  the  intelligent 
activity  of  all  the  people. 

This  stock  has  never  been  exceeded,  not  only  for  hardi- 
hood and  industry,  but  for  its  appreciation  of  the  benefits  of 
higher  education  and  of  the  better  things  of  life.  This  people 
held  three  things  to  be  cardinal  virtues  —  to  labor,  to  go  to 
church,  and  to  go  to  school.  This  is  the  people  that  founded 
Harvard  College  in  the  wilderness.  It  is  from  stock  of  this 
sort  that  the  typical  American  farmer  is  descended,  and  I 
would  see  him  so  trained  and  so  educated  as  to  remain  true 
to  his  type  for  all  time.  This  will  require  a  training  and  an 
education  that  cannot  be  imparted  by  any  form  of  European 
peasant  school,  however  modified;  but  it  will  require  the 
best  that  modern  human  ingenuity  can  devise.  This  great 
need  will  be  met,  when  it  is  met  if  ever,  not  by  old,  but  by 
new  systems  of  education,  and  they  must  be  wrought  by  our- 
selves to  meet  conditions  here. 

3.  To  educate  the  children  of  different  classes  separately 
is  to  prevent  that  natural  flow  of  individuals  from  one  pro- 
fession into  another  which  is  in  every  way  desirable  both 
from  the  public  and  the  private  standpoint.  If  the  children 
of  farmers  are  systematically  put  into  schools  where  only 
agriculture  is  taught,  many  a  good  lawyer  and  many  a  good 


citizen  will  be  spoiled  to  make  an  indifferent  farmer.  Boys 
do  not  necessarily  inherit  the  father's  profession.  In  a  very 
large  sense  their  natural  faculties  come  from  that  common 
stock  of  human  characters  that  constitute  the  heritage  of  the 
race,  and  the  individual  has  a  right  to  an  education  that  is 
broader  than  the  occupation  and  the  narrow  environment  in 
which  he  was  born.  True,  he  should  be  educated  through  and 
to  a  large  extent  by  means  of  his  environment,  because  that 
is  the  compass  of  his  own  experience ;  but  if  we  educate  him 
within  his  environment,  we  dwarf  him  in  the  process,  and  we 
do  not  truly  educate  him. 

Again,  many  a  boy,  city  born,  has  the  instinct  to  get  back 
to  Nature.  He  should  have  at  least  a  fair  chance  to  do  so. 
Because  a  girl  is  born  in  the  country  is  no  sign  in  America 
that  she  should  be  a  farmer's  wife;  nor  if  she  is  born  in  the 
city  is  it  a  sign  that  she  should  not.  My  plea  is,  in  the  name  of 
common  sense  and  American  citizenship,  educate  all  these 
people  together  in  one  school,  with  a  curriculum  varied  enough 
to  fit  for  more  than  one  occupation  and  more  than  one  mode 
of  life,  to  the  end  that  a  man  may  follow  the  occupation  of  his 
father  or  may  change  it,  as  he  pleases ;  but  whether  he  follow 
or  whether  he  change  he  shall  do  so  intelligently,  and  for  a 
reason,  and  in  either  case  he  shall  have  some  knowledge  of 
and  sympathy  for  the  occupation  and  the  life  of  his  neighbor. 

It  is  said  that  if  you  give  a  bright  boy  a  good  education 
and  broad  associations,  he  will  leave  the  farm,  and  the  only 
way  to  keep  him  there  is  to  train  him  to  be  contented  with  a 
humble  life.  That  false  theory  of  education  was  exploded 
long  ago.  Experience  has  abundantly  shown  that  education 
does  not  necessarily  result  in  taking  people  out  of  the  country 
except  when  that  education  is  one-sided  and  faulty,  as  witness 
the  graduates  from  some  of  our  greatest  universities.  I  have 
no  sympathy  with  the  plan  of  keeping  boys  on  the  farm  by 
the  blindfolding  process. 

There  was  a  time,  now  happily  past,  when  the  schools 
ignored  not  only  agriculture  but  all  industry.  Then  unthink- 
ing teachers  advised  bright  boys  and  girls  to  "get  an  educa- 
tion so  they  would  not  have  to  work."  This  sort  of  doctrine 


9 

found  fertile  soil  in  the  young  of  hard-working,  self-denying 
pioneers,  and  it  was  not  strange  that  most  young  men  who 
had  much  contact  with  the  schools  were  lost  not  only  to  the 
farm  but  to  industrial  life.  Then  it  was  that  men  saw  the 
best  of  the  young  crowding  into  professions  already  over- 
crowded, and  they  noted  with  sorrow  and  regret  that  edu- 
cation served  principally  to  draw  men  away  from  the  useful 
callings  and  to  pile  them  up  like  salmon  in  the  spawning  sea- 
son where  they  were  not  needed  or  wanted,  and  where  little 
awaited  but  their  own  destruction. 

The  country  is,  and  always  will  be,  the  great  breeding- 
ground  for  the  nation,  and  the  consequence  of  this  insane 
movement  cityward  of  the  choicest  men  and  minds  could  have 
had  but  one  final  effect — to  put  the  brains  in  the  city  and  the 
brawn  in  the  country.  It  was  not  strange  that  under  con- 
ditions such  as  these  thinking  men  first  denied  higher  educa- 
tion to  their  young  because  of  its  inevitable  consequences, 
and  then  came  to  demand  a  form  of  education  that  should 
really  serve  the  needs  of  industrial  people  as  well  as  those 
of  professional  people.  In  this  way  arose  the  separate  indus- 
trial schools,  but  later  experience  has  shown  that  one  extreme 
is  as  bad  as  the  other  —  that  industrial  training  without  edu- 
cation is  but  little  better  than  education  without  industry, 
and  that  both  will  inevitably  result  in  a  most  unfortunate 
sorting  process ;  both  alike  will  prevent  that  natural  flow  from 
one  profession  or  mode  of  life  to  another,  so  essential  to  meet 
the  natural  desires  of  individuals,  and  to  secure  that  homoge- 
neousness  of  population  with  which  only  institutions  such  as 
ours  are  safe,  or  even  possible. 

Though  it  is  true  that  educators  did  not  lead  in  the  move- 
ment for  industrial  education,  it  is  true  that  they  were  quick 
to  see  its  significance,  and  to-day  it  is  our  greatest  educators 
and  our  best  teachers  who  are  the  most  earnest  disciples  of 
the  doctrine  that  a  system  of  universal  education  should  fit 
for  all  the  needful  activities  of  a  highly  civilized  race,  to  the 
neglect  of  none  and  to  the  prejudice  of  none. 

And  this  is  a  perfectly  stupendous  problem.  Think  of  its 
new  complications !  In  the  old  days  all  that  was  necessary  was 


10 

to  maintain  whatever  schools  could  win  support  and  teach 
the  things  most  easily  taught  without  much  regard  to  the 
consequences.  Now  in  these  days  of  universal  education  we 
must  teach  what  the  world  needs  to  know  for  all  its  essential 
activities,  and  we  must  so  conduct  our  schools  as  not  to 
greatly  disturb  the  economic  or  social  balance  of  things;  so 
conduct  them  that  the  overflow  from  one  occupation  or  class 
shall  be  naturally  compensated  by  a  corresponding  inflow  of 
equally  desirable  individuals  from  others  —  all  of  which  is 
necessary  if  universal  education  is  to  be  an  unmixed  blessing. 

4.  Secondary  schools  devoted  solely  to  agriculture  would 
of  necessity  cover  so  much  territory  as  to  require  the  students 
to  board  and  room  away  from  home.     This  for  students  of 
the  high  school  age  is  unthinkable.    Every  boy  and  every  girl 
in  the  early  and  middle  "teens"  should  sleep  every  night  under 
the  father's  roof,  and  this  can  be  if  a  community  establishes 
a  single  school  capable  of  catering  to  all  its  needs,  and  does 
not  insist  upon  educating  one  class  here  and  another  there, 
compelling  long  journeys  to  get  to  the  right  school.    A  single 
agricultural  school  in  ten  counties,  or  in  five  counties,  or  in 
one  county — think  of  it! 

The  problem  of  secondary  education  is  very  largely  the 
problem  of  the  fourteen-year-old,  and  we  should  never  rest 
easy  till  every  farmer's  boy  and  girl  may  go  to  the  nearest 
high  school,  and  there  find  instruction  not  only  in  agriculture 
but  in  the  other  industries  and  professions  which  concern  the 
community,  and  after  having  lived  the  day  in  an  atmosphere 
broader  than  their  own  studies  go  home  again  at  night  to 
dream  of  what  a  great  thing  the  world  is  and  to  wake  with  an 
intelligent  appreciation  of  the  place  in  it  which  they  propose 
to  occupy. 

5.  Agriculture  not  only  needs  contact  with  other  interests, 
but  they  need  contact  with  agriculture.     Every  one  who  has 
had  experience  with  the  introduction  of  agriculture  into  our 
state  universities  will  bear  witness  that  the  benefits  of  asso- 
ciation are  mutual. 

In  the  university  which  I  have  the  honor  to  serve,  our 
agricultural  students  not  only  get  a  training  and  a  breadth  of 


11 

vision  which  they  could  never  get  in  an  institution  devoted 
solely  to  their  own  interests,  but  their  presence  on  the  campus 
is  of  distinct  advantage  to  the  other  students.  Their  direct- 
ness and  their  practical  methods  of  work  are  wholesome  to 
the  institution,  at  least  they  are  so  declared  by  the  non-agri- 
cultural professors  and  students  alike.  In  every  way,  as  I 
see  it,  much  is  lost  and  nothing  gained  by  separating  the  stu- 
dents of  different  classes  and  educating  them  apart,  each  in 
the  occupation  of  the  father. 

Nor  would  I  put  all  the  so-called  industries  in  one  class  of 
schools  and  the  professions  in  another.  In  a  large  sense  all 
study  is  professional,  and  in  a  very  large  sense,  indeed,  it  is 
also  industrial.  Some  portion  of  the  training  of  every  indi- 
vidual should  be  industrial,  even  manual,  and  another  portion 
of  the  training  of  every  individual  should  be  distinctly  mental, 
until  habits  of  thought  are  formed  quite  independent  of  material 
activity.  For  these  reasons,  which  are  fundamental,  I  would 
not  separate  industry  from  any  of  our  schools.  I  would  make 
it  an  integral  part  of  every  curriculum,  its  proportion  and 
character  depending  upon  the  prospective  profession  of  the 
individual;  but  above  all  I  would  have  the  essence  of  all 
occupations,  or  at  least  of  as  many  as  possible,  represented 
in  the  same  school. 

My  point  is,  if  all  these  subjects  and  professional  points  of 
view  are  offered  in  the  same  school  with  more  than  one  avenue 
into  life,  then  the  opportunity  is  presented  for  the  individual 
to  acquire  professional  knowledge  and  skill  without  becoming 
narrow  as  a  man.  If  farmers  and  lawyers  and  editors  and 
engineers  and  artists  and  merchants  are  educated  separately 
they  will  either  hate  or  despise  each  other,  or  both;  if  they 
are  educated  together,  each  will  acquire,  besides  proficiency 
in  his  own  line,  a  sympathy  for  others  that  comes  so  easily 
with  that  partial  knowledge  and  acquaintance  through  daily 
association  in  the  school  age,  and  that  comes  with  so  much 
difficulty  in  any  other  way.  A  farmer  at  our  university  is  a 
little  different  man  because  law  and  economics  and  engineer- 
ing and  Greek  are  well  taught  in  neighboring  buildings,  even 
though  he  never  take  one  of  the  courses  laid  down  in  the  cat- 


12 

alogue.  The  very  fact  that  they  are  taught,  and  that  he  asso- 
ciates with  those  who  do  take  them  —  all  this  has  its  effect, 
and  in  a  thousand  ways  a  man  absorbs  something  out  of  every 
activity  that  is  going  on  about  him.  My  point  again  is  that 
this  is  the  only  adequate  atmosphere  in  which  to  educate  an 
American  citizen,  whatever  his  occupation  is  to  be. 

6.  To  establish  separate  schools  for  agriculture  is  to 
injure  the  development  of  existing  high  schools.  These 
schools  are  not  "city  schools"  in  any  proper  sense  of  the  term. 
The  great  bulk  of  them  are  located  in  small  towns  and  vil- 
lages in  a  distinctly  rural  environment.  To  denominate  all 
these  as  "city  schools,"  to  be  devoted  solely  to  the  interests 
of  city  people,  is  as  absurd  as  it  is  unjust  to  them.  These 
schools  like  all  others  have  the  natural  right  to  minister  to 
their  constituency;  but  if  now  agriculture  is  to  be  put  off  into 
a  separate  system  of  schools  just  because  the  high  schools 
have  not  yet  taught  the  subject,  then  it  will  be  easy,  later  on, 
to  cleave  off  another  industrial  slice,  and  again  another  until 
the  remnant  that  remains  will  be  suited  to  nobody's  need,  un- 
worthy alike  of  the  school  and  the  community  it  was  estab- 
lished to  serve ;  and  instead  of  an  organized  system  of  effect- 
ive education  we  shall  have  an  incongruous  medley  of  separate 
and  independent  schools,  each  serving  its  little  clientele  in 
a  narrow  way  without  much  regard  to  the  public  good  —  all 
of  which  is  against  the  true  spirit  of  universal  education. 

The  American  high  school  is  a  new  institution.  It  has 
arisen  from  our  determination  to  make  education  truly  uni- 
versal. Now,  universal  education  means  that  all  the  people 
shall  be  educated,  and  in  such  a  way  that  all  the  activities 
necessary  to  a  highly  civilized  race  may  develop  and  go  for- 
ward. Only  a  small  per  cent  of  the  people  will  ever  go  to 
college  and  the  experiment  of  universal  education  will  be  tried 
out  in  the  field  of  the  secondary  schools.  These,  more  than  the 
colleges,  will  prove  to  be  the  agencies  by  which  the  masses  of 
the  people  will  get  their  training  and  their  trend.  For  this 
reason  the  future  welfare  of  these  schools  is  to  be  specially 
safeguarded;  but  every  subject  and  interest  that  is  taken 
away  from  the  high  school  in  the  present  stage  of  its  de- 


13 

velopment  lessens  by  that  much  its  power  to  serve  the  com- 
munity, and  by  that  much  it  is  a  menace  to  its  life  and 
efficiency  and  a  check  if  not  a  bar  to  its  further  development. 

7.  Separate  schools  in  agriculture  will  check  the  exten- 
sion of  high  schools  into  country  communities.    High  schools 
started  first  in  the  cities  it  is  true,  but  they  are  making  their 
way  rapidly  out  into  the  country,  a  tendency  that  is  to  be 
encouraged,  more  especially  as  they  are  showing  a  remark- 
able   disposition    to    respond    to   their    environment.      If   the 
interests  are  not  divided  it  is  entirely  possible  for  any  com- 
munity, without  going  beyond  driving  limits,  to  throw  all  its 
energies  into  a  school  of  secondary  grade  and  make  it  capable 
of  truly  reflecting   all   its   varied   interests.     This   has   been 
found    impossible    where    secondary    education    is    primarily 
under  ecclesiastical   influence;  it  will  also  be  found  impos- 
sible  if   interests   are   to   be   divided   and   as   many   separate 
schools  established  as  there  are  interests  to  be  served,  but  if 
they  will  stay  together  and  solve  their  problems  as  a  unit 
it  is   possible   for  every   prosperous   community  to   give   its 
young  people  at  their  very  doors  what  is  to  all  intents  and 
purposes  a  college  education. 

8.  It  is  unnecessary  to  found  separate  schools  in  order 
that    agriculture    shall   be    taught,    and   well   taught.      I    am 
enough    of   a    partisan   for    agriculture    to   demand    what    is 
needed  for  its  development :  to  advocate,  if  necessary,  separate 
schools  for  this  purpose,  even  if  they  should  result  in  reducing 
the  scope  and  curtailing  forever  the  full  and  possible  develop- 
ment of  the  high  school.     But  it  is  unnecessary  to  resort  to 
this  expedient  in  these  days.     It  was  necessary  to  do  so  in 
an  early  day  because  of  the  indifferent,  not  to  say  unfriendly 
attitude  of  the  schools  of  the  time,  all  of  which  were  organ- 
ized and  conducted  on  the  classical  basis  in  order  to  fit  for 
the    so-called    learned   professions.      Such    schools    had    little 
knowledge  of  and  less  sympathy  for  industrial  education,  and 
to  get  a  start  at  all  it  was  inevitable  that  separate  schools 
should  be  established  to  do  what  existing  schools  would  not 
in  those  days  undertake.  — 

But  conditions  are  changed.    We  are  living  now  in  a  new 


14 

age  —  in  an  age  which  recognizes  that  the  highest  purpose 
in  education  is  to  get  ready  to  live;  that  real  education  is 
active,  not  passive;  and  that  its  fruitage  is  service,  not  per- 
sonal gratification.  We  are  living  in  an  age  which  recognizes 
that  all  forms  of  useful  activity  can  be  made  yet  more  useful 
by  the  knowledge  and  the  graces  of  education;  and  that  the 
man  himself  is  bigger  than  his  occupation — bigger  than  that 
narrow  avenue  of  public  service  through  which  he  obtains  his 
livelihood  and  discharges  the  ordinary  debts  to  Nature.  We 
have  all  learned  this  lesson,  and  by  this  time  we  ought  to 
have  learned  it  well.  It  is  true  that  education  for  industrial 
people,  and  after  that  education  in  and  for  industry,  arose 
from  the  masses  and  was  forced  upon  the  schools.  I  do  not 
forget  all  this,  but  I  beg  to  call  your  attention  to  the  fact  that 
that  early  demand  was  a  selfish  one, — a  righteous  selfishness, 
it  is  true,  but  yet  selfish.  The  masses  wanted  education  for 
their  own  purposes,  and  it  caused  no  little  jolt  to  the  edu- 
cational juggernaut  when  they  proceeded  to  get  it.  But  when 
they  had  time  to  recover  their  breath,  educators  —  real  edu- 
cators—  began  to  take  stock  of  the  situation,  and  they  have 
commenced  in  these  days  a  new  policy  of  education  in  the 
world ;  a  policy  which  if  followed  out  will  develop  all  our 
resources,  both  industrial  and  intellectual ;  a  policy  which  will 
take  care  of  your  personal  needs,  and  mine,  and  yet  which 
is  as  broad  as  humanity  and  all  its  activities.  This  new 'policy 
is  working  successfully  in  our  great  state  universities  where 
men  of  all  classes,  aims,  and  prospects  are  educated  together 
from  the  standpoint  not  of  private  interest  but  of  the  public 
good.  The  same  policy  has  commenced  its  work  in  our  sec- 
ondary schools,  and  I  am  anxious  above  all  other  consider- 
ations that  these  schools  should  solve  this  whole  problem  for 
their  communities;  besides,  I  know  educators  well  enough  to 
believe  that  they  will  earnestly  undertake  to  do  it  if  they  are 
entrusted  with  the  duty,  which  is  also  a  privilege. 

These  modern  schools  must  have  a  fair  chance.  They  are 
new  institutions;  they  have  hardly  been  in  the  field  a  half 
century,  and  how  they  have  grown !  There  are  literally  hun- 
dreds of  them  that  aje  giving  a  better  education  than  colleges 


15 

gave  a  generation  ago,  and  they  have  only  commenced  to 
serve  the  people.  If  they  have  not  yet  solved  all  the  problems 
and  taught  all  the  subjects  the  people  need,  it  is  no  sign  that 
they  cannot  or  that  they  will  not,  and  they  should  be  given 
the  chance.  Every  new  addition  to  an  educational  institution 
not  only  serves  a  new  public  need,  but  it  enriches  all  that  was 
before.  All  the  modern  secondary  school  needs  in  order  to 
serve  us  perfectly  is  men  and  money,  and  time  to  learn  how. 

There  is  no  longer  an  "issue"  in  education  —  certainly  not 
concerning  the  fundamental  industries.  I  am  told  that  in 
certain  remote  sections  of  the  country  some  people  are  still 
fighting  the  Civil  War,  but  most  of  us  know  that  it  is  over. 
The  old  issues  are  settled  and  dead  and  left  behind.  New 
ones  have  arisen  to  command  our  attention,  and  it  is  un- 
worthy of  ourselves  to  expend  our  energies  on  lines  of  effort 
long  since  rendered  obsolete. 

Yes,  the  old  issues  between  the  classics  and  the  industries 
are  dead  and  the  sooner  they  are  forgotten  the  better.  I  have 
been  through  this  educational  conflict  myself  and  I  know  what 
it  is;  but  even  the  old  soldier  who  insists  upon  fighting  the 
Civil  War  over  again,  to-day,  will  get  no  audience.  New  prob- 
lems have  arisen  with  the  new  generation,  and  this  generation 
proposes  to  stand  on  whatever  has  been  gained  before  and 
expend  its  energies  in  forward  movements.  We  do  well  to 
imitate  its  example  in  this  matter.  The  new  issues  are  con- 
structive. 

9.  This  demand  that  agriculture  be  taught  in  the  public 
schools  is  but  part  of  the  great  modern  movement  for  indus- 
trial education.  Whoever  has  lived  close  to  the  great  heart  of 
the  common  people  and  has  had  his  hand  upon  the  pulse  can- 
not fail  to  have  felt  the  throbbings  of  this  new  impulse  for 
more  than  a  generation,  or  to  have  detected  its  first  feeble 
flutterings  an  hundred  years  ago.  And  whether  he  has  had  his 
ear  to  the  ground  or  not,  whether  he  has  lived  close  to  the 
heart  of  things  or  away  in  the  upper  atmospheres,  no  man  can 
now  be  ignorant  of  the  great  fact  that  a  change  is  coming  over 
the  spirit  of  the  times  regarding  educational  ideals ;  a  change 
that  is  fundamental,  and  whose  shadow  or  whose  light,  which- 


16 

ever  it  may  be,  is  full  upon  us  and  can  no  longer  be  averted  or 
ignored. 

When  each  community  had  but  one  or  two  educated  men — 
the  domine,  the  doctor,  and  perhaps  the  lawyer,  it  did  not 
greatly  matter  what  their  education  might  be  like;  but  when 
everybody  learned  to  read,  and  to  think,  which  was  inevitable, 
they  quickly  saw  that  the  system  and  the  subject  matter  of 
an  education  suited  to  the  office  and  the  study  were  ill-adapted 
to  fit  men  for  the  farm  and  the  shop,  but  exceedingly  well- 
adapted  to  unfit  them.  They,  before  the  educators,  learned 
that  the  benefits  of  education  were  capable  of  being  extended 
to  all  the  affairs  of  life,  material  as  well  as  intellectual. 

But,  as  has  been  repeatedly  noted,  educators  soon  caught 
the  true  spirit  of  the  new  demand  and  were  quick  to  respond. 
They  have  responded  so  well  as  to  discover  that  in  the  last 
analysis  there  is  an  intellectual  basis  to  all  industry  and  an 
industrial  basis  to  all  education  that  is  safe  for  everybody  to 
use;  they  have  shown  that  the  names  of  various  occupations 
are  but  names  for  different  forms  of  activity  and  service ;  that 
all  fundamental  occupations  are  learned  professions,  and  that 
any  form  of  education  that  fits  for  nothing  in  particular  is 
worse  than  useless,  even  dangerous. 

So  we  must  look  at  this  matter  broadly.  Our  problem  is 
but  a  part  of  a  more  general  one ;  moreover,  this  general  prob- 
lem of  how  to  educate  for  all  the  useful  activities  is  the  very 
problem  upon  which  all  educators  are  busily  at  work,  and 
they  are  solving  it  inch  by  inch  and  day  by  day.  It  is  for 
us  to  stay  with  the  crowd  and  be  in  at  the  finish. 

The  American  high  school  is  a  form  of  secondary  educa- 
tion that  has  arisen,  or  more  properly  speaking  is  arising,  to 
meet  this  new  demand  for  universal  education.  Agriculture, 
and  industrial  education  generally,  have  found  their  true 
place  in  the  universities.  The  next  step  is  that  they  should 
find  their  true  place  in  our  secondary  schools,  where,  after 
all,  our  attempt  at  universal  education  will  render  its  greatest 
service. 

And  so  reasons  might  be  multiplied  indefinitely,  showing 
why  it  is  wiser  to  go  forward  meeting  our  educational  neces- 


17 

sities  together  — but  they  would  all  be  of  the  same  general 
tenor;  viz.,  that  our  educational  problem  is  after  all  a  single 
problem  —  complex,  puzzling,  and  all  that;  but  it  is  a  single 
problem  after  all,  and  we  should  stay  together  and  solve  it. 

If  the  high  schools  were  as  indifferent  and  as  antagonistic 
toward  industrial  education  to-day  as  the  colleges  were  fifty 
years  ago,  I  would  raise  my  voice  loudest  for  a  separate  sys- 
tem of  agricultural  high  schools.  But  they  are  not  indifferent, 
they  are  interested;  they  are  not  antagonistic,  they  are  ex- 
ceedingly friendly.  Agriculture  has  found  its  place  in  our 
American  system  of  education,  so  far  as  colleges  are  con- 
cerned, and  its  place  is  in  most  honorable  company.  It 
remains  to  find  its  place  in  the  high  schools,  and  when  that 
place  is  found,  may  it  be  equally  honorable  and  equally  favor- 
able with  the  place  it  occupies  in  our  great  universities  where 
it  has  done  so  well. 


And  now  after  having  argued,  even  pleaded  for  the  pres- 
ervation of  the  integrity  of  our  system  of  secondary  educa- 
tion, there  are  two  points  on  which  I  wish  especially  not  to 
be  misunderstood: 

The  first  one  is  this :  When  I  speak  of  teaching  agriculture 
in  our  high  schools,  I  mean  agriculture.  I  do  not  mean  Nature 
study,  nor  do  I  mean  that  some  sort  of  pedagogical  kink 
should  be  given  to  chemistry  or  botany  or  even  geography 
and  arithmetic.  Let  these  arts  and  sciences  be  taught  from 
their  own  standpoint,  with  as  direct  application  to  as  many 
affairs  of  real  life  as  possible;  but  let  chemistry  continue  to 
be  chemistry;  let  agriculture  introduce  new  matter  into  the 
schools  and  with  it  a  new  point  of  view.  Nor  should  this  new 
matter  be  "elementary  agriculture."  In  some  ways  I  could 
wish  the  phrase  had  never  been  coined.  What  is  wanted  in 
our  high  schools  is  not  elementary  agriculture,  but  elemental, 
fundamental  agriculture.  For  this  purpose  we  should  select 
out  of  what  is  taught  in  our  colleges  those  phases  of  agri- 
culture that  are  adapted  to  use  in  the  high  school  and  yet 
that  strike  at  the  root  of  farm  life  and  its  affairs — something 


18 

that  will  appeal  to  real  farmers  and  that  will  serve  to  actually 
educate  their  boys  for  the  business  of  farming — soil  physics, 
soil  fertility,  laboratory  fields  in  crop  production,  the  use  of 
farm  machinery,  and  the  classification  and  principles  of  feed- 
ing of  live  stock. 

As  I  see  it,  every  high  school  that  has  a  natural  agricultural 
constituency  of  any  considerable  importance  should  put  in  a 
department  of  agriculture  on  the  same  basis  as  its  depart- 
ment of  chemistry,  and  proceed  to  offer  at  least  one  year  of 
real  technical  agriculture  taught  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
farm,  accompanied  by  such  collateral  instruction  in  the  arts 
and  sciences  as  shall  provide  a  suitable  course  for  such  of  its 
pupils  as  find  their  interests  in  the  country  and  on  the  farm. 

The  other  point  on  which  I  would  be  particular  is  this: 
I  am  not  arguing  that  the  high  schools  in  their  present  con- 
dition are  doing,  or  are  able  to  do,  what  is  needed  for  agri- 
culture. My  contention  is  that  they  can  get  ready  to  do  it, 
and  that  right  speedily;  and  that  if  they  will  proceed  to  get 
ready,  they  should  have  the  chance,  for  it  is  their  opportu- 
nity and  their  privilege;  and  if  they  do  not  propose  to  serve 
agriculture  and  her  people  as  faithfully  and  as  well  as  they 
are  serving  or  intend  to  serve  other  interests,  then  they 
should  be  compelled  to  do  it.  That  is  my  thesis  in  a  few 
words;  but  my  conviction  is  that  they  are  for  the  most  part 
fully  ready  to  turn  both  their  brains  and  their  tremendous 
efficiency  loose  on  our  problem  if  we  will  let  them. 

I  am  glad  to  say  that  we  have  a  perfect  understanding  on 
this  whole  matter  in  Illinois.  The  schools  are  not  yet  ready 
to  teach  agriculture,  but  they  will  get  ready.  I  would  better 
say,  they  are  ready  but  not  equipped.  We  do  not  yet 
possess  text-books  and  courses  of  study,  but  they  are  being 
prepared.  We  do  not  yet  have  competent  teachers,  but  they 
are  coming  along  and  the  demand  will  bring  the  supply.  The 
schools  look  directly  to  the  colleges  of  agriculture  to  furnish, 
out  of  their  experience,  the  most  suitable  material  for  these 
courses  and  to  train  the  first  supply  of  teachers.  This  they 
are  fully  able  to  do  and  I  am  prone  to  believe  that  together  we 
can  work  out  this  problem,  and  in  the  near  future  if  we  are  all 


19 

wise  and  persistent  we  can  provide  as  good  a  home  education 
for  the  farmer  as  for  other  classes  of  our  people. 

And  now  if  there  should  be  high  schools  which  prefer  to 
go  along  in  the  good  old  way  and  not  to  trouble  with  the 
newer  educational  needs  and  demands,  I  have  a  word  to  say 
to  them. 

What  our  educational  development  is  to  be  rests  largely 
with  existing  schools.  They  can  be  quick  to  catch  the  spirit 
of  a  new  order  of  things  educational  and  enlarge  both  their 
conceptions  and  activities;  or  the  new  demands  will  be  met 
by  a  new  system,  to  the  lasting  disadvantage  of  both  parties, 
as  I  see  it. 

We  cannot  afford  to  break  in  two  at  any  point;  least  of 
all  can  existing  schools  afford  to  see  our  educational  effort 
divided.  The  logic  of  the  situation  is  all  against  it.  The  new 
ideal  is  that  education  should  fit  for  something  instead  of 
fitting  for  nothing,  and  this  ideal  will  prevail  among  a  prac- 
tical people  like  ourselves.  Educators  can  take  hold  of  this 
natural  bent  for  practical  activity  and  cultivate  it  until  as  a 
people  we  shall  be  both  efficient  and  cultivated.  If  they  do 
not  do  this  the  efficiency  will  develop  by  itself  and  we  shall 
all  come  short  of  our  highest  possibilities. 

The  new  demand  upon  the  schools  is  that  they  should  not 
only  picture  life  as  it  was  in  the  past,  but  also  as  it  is  now; 
that  they  should  assist  the  student  in  understanding  modern 
life  into  which  he  must  plunge,  and  whose  responsibilities  he 
must  shortly  assume.  The  student  feels  the  right  to  demand 
that  some  portion  of  his  educational  career  and  some  part  of 
his  school  curriculum  should  be  devoted  to  making  application 
of  the  wisdom  of  the  ancients  and  the  philosophy  of  life  to 
the  conditions  of  modern  existence. 

Reduced  to  the  lowest  terms  and  pushed  to  the  last  an- 
alysis, that  is  all  this  new  movement  means  in  any  of 
its  forms — agricultural  or  other ;  viz.,  that  the  school  hold  up 
a  true  picture  of  life  in  all  its  activities,  and  that  teaching  be 
conducted  from  the  standpoint  of  living,  not  merely  of  mental 
development ;  that  the  school  shall  be  a  true  mirror  of  human 
life,  modern  as  well  as  ancient,  and  of  what  men  do  as  well 


20 

as  of  what  they  think  and  say.  In  other  words,  that  a  system 
of  universal  education  shall  universally  educate, — not  in  art 
without  industry;  not  in  industry  without  art,  but  in  both 
art  and  industry  so  joined  as  to  make  possible  the  highest 
civilization  and  the  greatest  development  of  which  the  human 
race  is  capable.  To  this  end  may  agriculture,  like  every  other 
form  of  useful  activity,  find  its  place  in  our  existing  system  of 
education,  and  may  that  place  be  one  that  comports  with  the 
importance  of  the  profession,  the  mode  of  living  of  its  fol- 
lowers, and  the  philosophy  of  life  on  which  our  great  social 
structure  rests ;  for  after  all,  the  greatest  thing  in  the  world 
is  to  live  a  full  and  perfect  life. 

Sixty  years  ago  Professor  Turner  wrote:  "All  civilized 
society  is,  necessarily,  divided  into  two  distinct  co-operative, 
not  antagonistic,  classes : — a  small  class,  whose  proper  busi- 
ness it  is  to  teach  the  true  principles  of  religion,  law,  medicine, 
science,  art,  and  literature;  and  a  much  larger  class  who  are 
engaged  in  some  form  of  labor,  in  agriculture,  commerce,  and 
the  arts.  For  the  sake  of  convenience,  we  will  designate  the 
former  the  Professional,  and  the  latter  the  Industrial  class; 
not  implying  that  each  may  not  be  equally  industrious;  the 
one  in  their  intellectual,  the  other  in  their  industrial  pursuits. 
Probably  in  no  case  would  society  ever  need  more  than  five 
men  out  of  one  hundred  in  the  professional  class,  leaving 
ninety-five  in  every  hundred  in  the  industrial;  and,  so  long  as 
so  many  of  our  ordinary  teachers  and  public  men  are  taken 
from  the  industrial  class,  as  there  are  at  present,  and  probably 
will  be  for  generations  to  come,  we  do  not  really  need  over 
one  professional  man  for  every  hundred,  leaving  ninety-nine 
in  the  industrial  class. 

"The  vast  difference,  in  the  practical  means,  of  an  appro- 
priate liberal  education,  suited  to  their  wants  and  their  des- 
tiny, which  these  two  classes  enjoy,  and  ever  have  enjoyed 
the  world  over,  must  have  arrested  the  attention  of  every 
thinking  man.  True,  the  same  general  abstract  science  exists 
in  the  world  for  both  classes  alike,  but  the  means  of  bringing 
this  abstract  truth  into  effectual  contact  with  the  daily  busi- 
ness and  pursuits  of  the  one  class  does  exist,  while  in  the 
other  case  it  does  not  exist  and  never  can  till  it  is  new  created. 

"The  one  class  have  schools,  seminaries,  colleges,  univer- 
sities, apparatus,  professors,  and  multitudinous  appliances  for 
educating  and  training  them  for  months  and  years,  for  the 
peculiar  profession  which  is  to  be  the  business  of  their  life; 


21 

and  they  have  already  created,  each  class  for  its  own  use,  a 
vast  and  voluminous  literature,  that  would  well  nigh  sink  a 
whole  navy  of  ships. 

"But  where  are  the  universities,  the  apparatus,  the  profes- 
sors, and  the  literature,  specifically  adapted  to  any  one  of  the 
industrial  classes?  Echo  answers  where?  In  other  words, 
society  has  become,  long  since,  wise  enough  to  know  that  its 
teachers  need  to  be  educated,  but  it  has  not  become  wise 
enough  to  know  that  its  workers  need  education  just  as 
much." 

Professor  Turner  was  pleading  for  an  Industrial  Univer- 
sity to  serve  the  educational  needs  of  the  95  per  cent  as  those 
of  the  5  per  cent  were  served  by  the  then  existing  colleges. 

His  "dream"  is  realized  and  more  than  realized.  In  every 
state  there  is  now  at  least  one  institution  of  college  grade 
ministering  directly  to  these  higher  needs  of  industrial  life. 
And  what  a  change  they  have  wrought  in  the  few  years  of 
their  activity!  How  the  industries  of  life  are  developing  un- 
der the  benign  and  stimulating  influence  of  higher  education 
and  systematic  thought.  How  the  people  themselves  are  im- 
proving as  their  occupations  develop  and  take  honorable  place 
among  men! 

All  this  has  come  about.  But  since  Professor  Turner  wrote 
the  words  I  have  quoted,  an  entirely  new  system  of  schools 
has  sprung  up  all  over  the  country — a  kind  of  schools  un- 
known in  his  day  and  which  does  not  exist  elsewhere  than  in 
America. 

I  refer,  of  course,  to  the  high  school.  Equipped  as  it  is  to 
give  what  is  in  effect  a  college  education,  this  institution  of 
the  people  is  the  most  powerful  modern  agency  for  shaping 
American  life.  The  high  schools  of  the  country  touch  all  the 
people  of  all  classes,  and  their  influence  is  beyond  compu- 
tation. 

And  now,  I  ask  the  final  question:  Is  this  new  system  of 
schools  to  serve  only  Professor  Turner's  5  per  cent  as  did 
the  old  time  college,  or  are  they  to  serve  the  full  100  per  cent  ? 
Are  the  high  schools  to  serve  the  people  on  the  same  broad 
plan  of  modern  colleges,  or  are  they  to  restrict  their  attention 
and  their  service  to  the  few  favored  occupations? 


22 

These  great  schools  can  serve  all  classes  and  all  interests 
if  they  will.  It  is  merely  a  question  of  organization.  Do  I 
hear  the  objection  that  their  courses  are  full — then  I  will  say, 
make  others.  Do  we  have  no  material?  The  material  lies  all 
about  us,  in  the  present-day  activities  of  men  and  in  the  great 
body  of  scientific  truth  that  is  rapidly  accumulating.  Are  our 
teachers  unprepared?  Then  let  them  prepare  themselves;  for 
as  sure  as  time  passes,  this  matter  is  upon  us,  and  this  ques- 
tion will  press  for  its  solution. 

If  the  existing  high  schools  cannot  or  will  not  serve  the 
interests  of  agriculture  and  her  people,  then  just  as  certain 
as  the  sun  rises  and  sets,  a  system  of  schools  will  be  founded 
that  will  do  it.  The  farmers  of  this  country  are  bent  on  good 
secondary  education  that  will  fit  for  country  life,  and  if  they 
are  obliged  to  found  a  new  system  of  schools  to  get  it,  then 
they  will  do  that  and  insist  upon  a  fair  division  of  the  revenues. 

Let  me  be  not  misunderstood.  It  is  not  upon  an  endowed 
institution  to  teach  agriculture,  unless  it  chooses  to  do  so ;  un- 
less it  sees  in  the  subject  large  educative  possibilities  within 
the  chosen  line  of  its  activities  and  for  which  it  is  endowed. 

It  is  different  with  the  high  school.  This  is  a  public 
school,  supported  by  public  funds,  and  its  obligation  is  to 
serve  the  public  well  in  all  its  interests — to  put  its  service 
on  the  same  plan  as  that  of  the  state  colleges  and  universities, 
and  the  temper  of  the  public  mind  is  such  as  to  force  the  issue, 
if  necessary.  If  it  becomes  necessary  to  found  a  separate  sys- 
tem of  schools  to  do  this  work  it  will  be  the  worse  for  all  of  us 
and  the  better  for  none.  If  we  go  on  together  and  our  high 
schools  serve  agriculture  and  her  people  as  faithfully  and  as 
well  as  they  serve  others,  then  all  will  be  well. 

This  then  is  the  place  of  agriculture  in  our  scheme  of  edu- 
cation—  that  it  shall  become  an  integral  part  of  our  educa- 
tional system,  to  the  end  that  all  great  interests  shall  be 
served  equally  well  by  a  single  comprehensive  system  of 
schools;  and  the  next  step  is  to  see  to  it  that  agriculture  shall 
attain  the  same  important  and  honorable  place  in  our  high 
schools  that  it  has  already  attained  in  our  universities. 


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